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When AG Hair moved into its new, 70,000-sq.-foot, state-of-the-artwork producing facility in Coquitlam, B.C., two years in the past, it was section of a prepare to supercharge enlargement of its hair treatment product or service line to salons in worldwide marketplaces. Europe was upcoming on its checklist. Then COVID-19 hit.
Not only was the European enlargement set on maintain, but salons in major marketplaces across Canada and the United States were temporarily shut. Extremely couple were obtaining hair solutions, so producing was halted in mid-March, leaving most of the company’s 82 staff members out of perform.
AG Hair could have waited out the pandemic but in its place decided to lean into its entrepreneurial lifestyle and make a sharp pivot. It began furnishing hand-sanitizing merchandise for entrance-line wellbeing-treatment employees, addressing a world wide shortage.
“We realized there was this large require for wellbeing-treatment specialists, and we wished to make a big difference and be capable to provide them with the solutions they wanted,” states AG Hair CEO Graham Fraser.
AG Hair received Canadian and U.S. approvals a 7 days right after making use of for the licences necessary to make sanitizer, and produced samples to demonstrate area authorities within just 48 several hours.
AG Hair’s Coquitlam facility has pivoted to producing hand sanitizer (Photograph by Alana Paterson)
“That immediate response time, and the point that we experienced gone by way of all of the Wellness Canada regulatory hurdles, showed [the local health authorities] that we had been a companion they could have faith in and anyone they could glimpse to, to supply the goods they required,” Fraser states.
In just a month, the business started off pumping out the solutions, initial for the wellbeing-care marketplace, then for people on its own web site and on Amazon. About 10 for every cent of AG Hair’s hand-sanitizer generation also went to people in require, as discovered by companies this kind of as United Way.
Parallel 49 Brewing Enterprise is also using AG Hair’s Coquitlam producing facility to produce its individual mix of liquid hand sanitizer for entrance-line health and fitness and crisis workers, in partnership with the B.C. federal government.
Fraser credits his workforce for its electricity and creativeness in making the hand-sanitizer manufacturing materialize, and assisting place AG Hair team again to operate.
“We understood we experienced an possibility . . . and then it grew to become this outstanding, just about war-place mentality and collaboration with our proprietors, our govt workforce and our individuals to say, ‘How are we heading to get via this?’ ” Fraser recollects. “I imagine our accomplishment speaks to the form of folks we have and the entrepreneurial spirit of pursuing every single avenue we have, knowledge how we can create the items and generating it take place.”
AG Hair’s commitment to investing in long term progress is a large element of what makes it a Best Managed organization, claims Nicole Coleman, a partner at Deloitte and co-direct of its Best Managed Program in B.C.
“Capability and innovation come by way of really strongly with this corporation,” states Coleman, who is also AG Hair’s coach at Deloitte. “I never assume they would be in a position to pivot as speedily if they weren’t so strategic and experienced the inner capabilities to do it.”
The manufacturing facility was a large investment decision, but one Coleman claims has previously compensated dividends.
“They had been seeking ahead with a strategic strategy in mind about long run advancement and how they could broaden, relatively than just concentrating on the working day to working day,” she states. “Best Managed providers are constantly pushing the envelope and are acutely aware about planning for the future.”
AG Hair was established in Vancouver in 1989 by hairstylist John Davis and graphic artist Lotte Davis. The husband-and-wife staff started bottling hair products in their basement and promoting them immediate to salons from the back of a station wagon.
The company ultimately moved its producing off-site, to a 3rd occasion. 1 day, John went to watch the functions and was amazed to see salt currently being poured into the combination. Though he was told salt is frequently utilised as a thickener, he did not like the potential side results of dry hair and skin.
It was at that moment John determined the enterprise would oversee its own production. “Through that encounter, John also became an qualified in merchandise progress,” states Fraser, who came to the company in 2000 as director of profits.
Soon after obtaining worked for a lot more than two decades at PepsiCo and Kraft Meals, Fraser was eager to do the job at a scaled-down, a lot more agile corporation where by he felt he could support make a distinction.
“It was perfect simply because I acquired to provide a great deal of construction and approach that I figured out in individuals organizations, but I also realized an terrible lot about staying an entrepreneur from John and Lotte: that sense of urgency, the conclusion-producing process, the require to get factors performed and generate items ahead and pursue chances,” he claims.
Fraser has aided drive AG Hair’s expansion into the U.S. and internationally, which includes Australia, Taiwan, and Central and South The usa. A part of its sales go to One Woman Can, a charity founded by Lotte that presents education, education and mentoring for girls in sub-Saharan Africa.
Fraser also oversees the enhancement of new, trending products and solutions, together with a new deep-conditioning hair mask produced with 98 per cent plant-primarily based and natural substances. Hand-sanitizing spray and gel will be the most current addition to the company’s product or service lineup.
“We really don’t see the need [for hand-sanitizing products] likely absent,” he states. “As the isolation procedures begin to get lifted, people today are likely to will need varieties of safety and protocols as they get back into standard daily life and function. We see there’s going to be a have to have for these forms of solutions very long-time period.”
This write-up seems in print in the June 2020 issue of Maclean’s journal with the headline, “Working out the kinks.” Subscribe to the regular monthly print journal right here.
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